Plants and their children

by Frances Theodora Parsons

Late in the year, when these clusters have turned into fruit, they look like this picture (Fig. [200]).

Fig. 200

The pretty birches are cousins to the alders, and keep house in much the same way, bearing the tassels with stamens (Fig. [201], a) and the little clusters made up of flowers with pistils (Fig. [201], b) on the same tree.

Fig. 201

The tassels on some of the birches are very beautiful. When full grown, they are golden yellow, and so long and soft and graceful that one feels like stroking them and playing with them as he would with a kitten.

I hope every country child who reads this book and does not already know the willows, the alders, and the birches, will make their acquaintance this spring, and will examine their two kinds of flowers. And I hope that branches from the different trees will be brought into the city schoolroom, so that all can see these flowers, which are among the very earliest of the year.